Waking up to nothing Pt. 1

I gave a start as I suddenly realized that I was not at work. What tipped me off was how companies don't usually put their work on hard metal slabs looking up at incredibly bright lights that made it impossible to see anything else. Azmuth, the old fool, certainly wouldn't and yet...

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Wait.

W-what? What the fuck? I tried to get up to no avail. Where am I? Why can't I move?! I shouted mentally as my head whipped side to side as I tried to see something, anything to help me figure out what had happened. Though no matter how hard I tried I was unable to move my body much of anything.

And what's worse there was a hole in my memory.

Or... was it memories?

I-I don't know. I don't what's going on?

Was there an accident? An attack? No, surely not, there's no way Tennyson would allow such a thing. I thought before I felt a sudden pit of dread in my stomach. But if there was an attack is that why I can't move?! Am I paralyzed?!

Wait no that wouldn't make sense, I was locked up again after one of my schemes failed... Again! And just after I escaped after clean-up duty too!

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...Wait. No. Wasn't I... I felt a headache come on as I tried to remember what I was doing before I was... wherever it is that I am now. I was in an office... wasn't I?

At least, I think so.

There was movement in the corner of my vision, and I turned my head hoping it was someone who could help me. But whatever I was going to say next died in my throat at what I saw.

What stepped out of the darkness into my vision wasn't human. Humanoid perhaps, but the word reptilian was the first thing that came to mind. The weirdest thing is that I've never seen such a species before. Sure I wasn't the most, well-travelled Galvan but I was familiar with other species, not just the ones in, or planned to be in the Omnitrix. I was at the top of my biology classes after all.

The head reminded me of some kind of dinosaur. Or perhaps crocodilian adjacent. It's definitely reptilian though. The skull was expanded in the back, and the way it tilted its head as it looked at me was birdlike.

Somewhat similar to a Pturbosaurian. The one Tennyson calls, Astrodactyl.

Wait... Tennyson? That name sounds... familiar?

Green scales covered it where I could see its body, but some kind of jumpsuit covered most of its body.

Odd.

It was a little shorter than me if I had to guess, 'Wait wouldn't that make them smaller than a Galvan?', and the stilted way it moved along with the shape of its legs and arms made it clear that it wasn't built in the same manner as a human nor a Galvan.

"What the fuck are you?" My mind, or minds? whirled in a tizzy. I-I don't understand what was going on. Was I not on Galvan B or even the hell hole that was Earth?

Bu-But wasn't I on Earth to start with? Why, why am I-

The… thing let out a series of hisses and growls which I believe it was speaking, but I couldn't understand it. Sometimes I wish I installed a translator in my Ultimatrix. Granted I would rarely need it but still.

B-But it would still be useful no? I mean even if I'm on Earth there were never any reptile people hidden underground. Not even in Undertown.

Could those conspiracies be right? No surely not. There's no way that would be true.

I snapped out of my mini-fugue as the lizard thing gestured and a small drone of some sort floated out from behind him. Is that a medical Drone? Is my body really that damaged for such a thing to be needed?

It was, almost comically, shaped like a small flying saucer, and it had something clutched beneath it in a claw-like appendage. I couldn't get a good look at it given the darkness surrounding me.

It was almost stereotypical. I mentally rolled my eyes.

It was about the size of my fist and looked rough and chitinous, its dull grey colour non-reflective. The drone floated over to me and promptly opened its claw, dropping the object onto my chest.

I had only about a second to tilt my head and look at the insectile thing with a raised brow before whatever had been dropped onto my chest suddenly deployed its small sharp legs into my chest.

My first scream was more out of shock rather than pain, but such screams did follow came shortly after when I felt the thing start to burrow and expand through my torso. Even as I screamed though I could see the grey material start to spread across my chest, and as I saw my body start to morph and change I tried to transform into something, anything that would get me out of this situation. Any species would do.

And I could feel every painful inch as it worked its way up to my head as my body tried to change into something, a Tetramand, a Vaxasaurian, a Pyronite, a Galilean, anything. But to no avail as for some reason my DNA-altering ability wasn't working properly.

The red light that usually appeared with my transformations was sparse and irregular.

Something was wrong. And I could feel it.

Instead of the usual quick and easy changing of my body, it felt as if it was being ripped apart from the inside out I felt the extra pair of arms quickly rip through my sides before being forcefully pulled back in as my bones tried to expand before contracting as I was lit on fire and rock formations burst out of my body.

And what felt worse was when the fire burned out as a heavy gravitational force began to mess with my body.

Something's wrong!

I… Oh god no. I felt my body being ripped apart from the inside out. Both from the strange machine and my own, suddenly defective transformation. I don't want this! I DON'T WANT-!

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It was dark, cold, and silent. Everything felt... off.

Wrong.

It was complete bullshit is what it was!

It took me a bit to realize that I wasn't hallucinating. It can be hard to tell when you suddenly find yourself blinded and… Paralyzed? Restrained? Yes, I believe restrained.

The point is I had this weird... sensation in and across my body. The only other thing I had to me were memories of what had just happened to me, which featured pain, terror and, sitting in a completely dark room. I tried to calm down by focusing on breathing…

I tried my best to calm down but there was a part of my brain, or would it be a side of my brain? That couldn't fully rationalize what happened to me.

Which brought on a question. Who or what was I? And why do I have two sets of memories?

I took a deep breath as I went through my memories. I was at an office, right? Or was I cleaning up Galvan Prime's Capital city I destroyed when I-

Wait.

Galvan?

Why- Shouldn't- Wasn't I- I clutched my head in agony as a rush of both familiar and strange memories and emotions flooded my brain. It felt as if I was being dunked in scorching hot magma only I didn't have the freedom of dying from it.

In a fit I can only call unsightly I began maddingly cursing to the high heavens to make the pain stop.

I- What the hell am I? I recoiled in my cell. My head felt like it was splitting open. Memories of two completely separate lives washed over me like a tidal wave and I had no way to stop it. It felt like I was drowning.

Though, thankfully, it began to calm down.

My mind was still blurry but I felt much better. I still felt like shit mind you, but baby steps people, baby steps.

That... This wasn't like me. Or at least half of me.

In any case, I'm not sure how long I spent like that. Panicking over and being in a disembodied nightmare I couldn't wake up from.

However, I'm good at adapting, and eventually, I managed to force myself to calm down and focus. I forced any and all of my fears and my uncertainty down into my mental vault. I didn't care if this would cause me some physiological issues later. My current objective is survival and that's all that matters right now.

Before I could figure out what was going on, I needed to pull myself together, get my body back under control, or just get feeling back. Not that I knew how to do that. My memories were muddled up. I guess that's what you get when two people get fused into one.

But now is not the time to dwell on that. It's time to make sure that everything is where it should be. Looking down to my right hand I checked to see if my Ultimatrix was still there. And sure enough, it was. And it looked just as I made it. It resembled a fingerless human glove that went up to my wrist. Black plates covered my knuckles as four white small tubes curved from the dial at the centre round into the sides of the metal glove.

It may not have the safety features of the original as it was made as a stabiliser first and foremost but it's good to see that what features I did have either kept it attached or those reptile people didn't bother to mess with it.

Which, now that I think about it, would be odd. Either they saw nothing interesting in it or they tried to hack into it and found nothing of worth or stopped investigating it.

Bring my left hand over the dial and activated it; silhouettes of various alien species showed themselves on my Ultimatrix as I turned the dial. All that I was familiar with. Either because I or Tennyson used them or because they were species I was familiar with.

Feeling satisfaction well up inside me I quickly suppressed the feeling as I inspected my body. Something that I had ignored based on the order of importance.

And it's with this that I found a discrepancy. I was back in the body of a 16-year-old Ben Tennyson. Though something was amiss. My skin was darker than it should have been. Still a sickly-looking pale. But darker nonetheless. My only guess was that my body was fused with someone else's. And given I have two contradicting sets of memories I am entitled to believe it.

Taking another breath to calm myself down from my growing anxiety and looked over at the hole in my black shirt, where that spherical machine had burrowed into my body and done... something.

I'll have to figure that out later.

Gripping my torn shirt I gritted my teeth angrily. I had paid a pretty penny to get high-quality human clothes. Especially for my stage show. And I doubt that I'll be able to get a replacement anytime soon.

Looking at my chest I began to expect it for any sign of the machine and I found...

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Nothing.

Not a scratch not a cut nor scab. Nothing!

It was as if whatever had borrowed into my body had let no evidence of such. As if it never happened. And what's worse; I have no way to find out how.

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How?!

Was it the machine?

Was it those reptile people?

Tell me damnit!

You can't expect me to sit idly by in this room while my queries go unanswered!

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Eventually, I calmed back down. Mostly because I had nothing else to do, side pace around the room aimlessly. Once I got moving I quickly discovered I was trapped in a small rectangular room, which seemed to be made entirely out of metal or something close to it. Even after stumbling around till I found a door didn't help, as no matter how much I clawed, punched, burned, froze or electrified at the thing I could barely scratch it.

I may have partial experience in a cell but that didn't make it any less frustratingly boring. I was so frustrated at my own powerlessness that it drove me up the walls.

Quite literally.

Well, I guess there's a bit of a silver lining to this. I thought bleakly as I sat on the ceiling, my pointy Cerebrocrustacean legs somehow finding enough purchase on the smooth metal to let me remain where I was. Strange.

All the surfaces felt smooth.

I let out a hissing sigh, enjoying what little I could from the act. I didn't understand how this was possible. Lizard people that I had never seen before were one thing, but a room completely immune to my transformations was…

Ok, let's review. I thought as I released my grip and fell to the ground, landing daintily on my feet as I did so. Having the ability to levitate via electrokinesis did that for you.

The fall was only about a eight-foot drop to the ground, and even in my blinded state due to the lack of light, I could sense when to brace for impact.

Either I was a human on my way to work, or I was a Galvan. Either way, I was apparently abducted by a lizard race neither of my memories can confirm the existence of. And this race who have for one reason or another decided to experiment on me using some… thing, which in turn fused into and/or embedded into my body. Later I wake up and find that said body is now, if my impression is correct, has been somehow fused with someone else.

I moved slowly as I once again began to pace around my cell and think over what has happened to me over... however long I've been here. As I began to look over my memories of our interaction, trying to figure out anything about them I―

Wait a minute... Why did it hurt for me to transform?

Th-That shouldn't have happened. I-I... What.

How could I have forgotten about that?

My mind began to race thinking about how such a thing could have happened. My DNA should have altered and I had already been transforming into various species and nothing. No pain, no hint of it at all. And yet when I was on that operating table I was feeling like I was going through hell.

Such a thing shouldn't have been possible.

...Unless.

I climbed up a wall as red electricity slowly danced around my cranium.

Perhaps this strange fusion of mine had caused some complications within my DNA and thus, my transformations. Since my new human side wouldn't have this in their DNA my transformations would suffer as well. But then that brings up a question.

I was now, once again on the ceiling. The electricity that coursed around my cranium had since magnified and was jumping off around me, lighting up my surroundings.

That machine that had burrowed into me was meant to, and seems to, have fixed that issue.

Which means that I've been here for, at least, far longer than I originally calculated. Seeing as they had the time to do tests on me, understand my changed biology enough to know that a problem would arise if I transformed as I was and had the time to create a machine to fix said problem.

No matter how advanced a race may be time is still one thing that is always a constant when it comes to discoveries and understanding.

Whatever that thing was, my body still remains intact and in good condition. I was alive. It hadn't killed me. I still could feel my heartbeat, and most of the other tiny sensations inherent in a human body that you just kind of tune out after a while.

In their place was… tingling wasn't quite the right word. When I focused on the area where the machine should be, my skin in that area felt... itchy? It was almost as if chittering were somehow tactile, for all the sense that made. Vibrating in anticipation, like it was waiting for something.

Yeah, well I'm waiting for some goddamn explanations! I thought sullenly. I-I don't want this thing in my chest! My human side annoyingly flared up a bit. And yet there were times when I swore I could feel fragments of the thing for the briefest moments, a faint spark of something or impression. I let out an irritated growl with as much force I could muster, satisfied by the noise but surprised by the sudden, odd constriction of muscles I forgot I had.

Cerebrocrustaceans weren't known for speaking with their actual mouths.

Suddenly I had a sort of mental snap, and with the sudden sensation of my mind crossing a spark I saw the room in a strange, red burst. Not an image per se, but I perceived the entire room as an impression of surfaces and corners, the impression of angles and distances in a way I never had before.

And in an instant it was gone again and I was back in darkness. Even the electricity that was bouncing around me had disappeared. The only thing that was left was small, disjointed sparks that periodically jumped to life before fizzling out into the nothingness.

I remained still for a moment contemplating what just happened before I flexed those unknown muscles in my cranium in the same way, and again the same exact image popped into my head.

Electroreception? I realized. Fascinating. I mused mentally. I suppose I should have expected something like this. This species has always been a bag of tricks; telekinesis and perhaps even levitation are just some of the utilities of their advanced mental capabilities.

I spent what I was the following hour and a half pacing about my cell in my human form, getting used to my new "sight" though if we would take into consideration my time spent awake then it would be two hours, forty-five minutes and twelve seconds awake. Not that it helped my current situation much. I was still locked in a goddamn box!

Why. I thought as I moved restlessly as my eyes began to narrow in iritation. Why would they do this me? What do they gain out of it? They already have my DNA. My heart rate began to quicken as various paranoid thoughts swarmed my mind. I-Is this what they wanted to happen? Me to lose my mind in here? A-Are they going to use my DNA to create an army of transforming aliens?

While that half of my brain spiralled the other half started its own lines of thought that intermingled and slowly calmed me down.

What more did those who I assumed were my captors want? If they planned to turn me into some kind of living weapon they hadn't done a great job of endearing me to that prospect. You'd think that they would have fit me with a sort of control collar at least.

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Oh, those motherfuckers.